News flash: Lakers won't win them all

These Lakers will be entertaining. They will be successful. They will be interesting, from the start to the finish, which, of course, their fans expect to arrive in the form of a parade in June.

We aren't going to guarantee that will happen, folks. But we will promise you the one thing, these Lakers positively won't be this season:

Undefeated.

This team absolutely will lose, something the Lakers made abundantly clear with their bizarrely winless preseason.

Yet, even if the Lakers had been healthy and together and gone
8-Oh, boy they're gonna be great in those exhibitions, they still weren't finishing 82-0 in the games that actually count.

So, ready yourself, Laker Nation, for befuddling struggles, losing streaks and alarm-sounding trips. En route to winning probably 55-60 times, the Lakers will have stretches that force all 15 debate shows on ESPN to argue about whether the team is a complete failure and what should be done — Fire him?
Flog him! — with Mike Brown.

Oh, yeah, the Lakers, rebuilt and reloaded, are going to have moments, lots of them. But they're also going to have issues, more than you'd like.

“It's been painful and ugly at times, but, you know, this is going to pay off,” Steve Nash said of the preseason. “There have been moments when you doubt and question yourself. But overall, (I'm) just excited and thrilled because I really think we're going to gain a lot from this experience.”

We felt compelled to address this subject today, especially before the opener, because Lakers fans historically haven't dealt well with defeat. There isn't a fan base in America better at concocting ominous, foreboding obstacles from a few nagging speed bumps. Let's call this superficial mountain range the Rocky Molehills.

This is partly because of the fans' utter lack of practice at handling disappointment but also can be attributed to the suffocating coverage the Lakers receive.

And now, they have a television channel dedicated to detailing their every development, good and not so good. In other words, when Dwight Howard goes 4 for 14 from the free-throw line, those 10 misses will be dissected down to the DNA he left on the ball.

This is a puzzle with two very intricate, key pieces added. Expecting things to fuse quickly is as nonsensical as Metta World Peace, who, don't forget, announced in late summer that he really wants these Lakers to finish 73-9.

“We're all just trying to figure this out and get it to work,” Nash said. “I think that is the biggest factor. All five of the starters have been
TheGuy at times in their careers. To try to fit in, but at the same time, you know, exploit your talents, that's the tough part. I think each guy is struggling with that, too.”

Think back two years, when another team made a couple seismic offseason additions and entered its opener eyelid-deep in expectation. The 2010-11 Miami Heat lost that first game.

The Heat also lost 4 of 5 in late November, four in a row in mid-January and five consecutive in early March.

In case you forgot, there was a point that season when Chris Bosh complained about how he was being used. Dwyane Wade was criticized for lacking leadership. LeBron James had his heart continually questioned.

And then, there was the day when Coach Erik Spoelstra, explaining the locker-room atmosphere after a loss, famously revealed “a couple of guys were crying in there.”

That fueled ESPN's debate shows for a solid week! The only thing more fruitful for the network would have been if the players tearing up somehow had included Tim Tebow.

That Heat team eventually won 58 games and lost in The Finals to Dallas, a season-ending disappointment undone spectacularly, of course, the next time around.

Folks, with the Lakers, this will be a process and, as such, will feature fits of regress. They also are running a new system — including elements of the Princeton offense — and, let's be honest, during the exhibition season the Lakers at times looked just like Princeton, a team that often scores in the 50s.

They will, however, figure things out and put together some impressive streaks. Recall the 2003-04 Lakers, who added Karl Malone and Gary Payton, and opened 18-3. We won't mention how that season ended.

“I'm encouraged by this team,” Nash said. “I'm encouraged by the coaching staff. This is good. We need all this time to learn and grow and get better.”

Because they are so experienced individually — if not yet as one — the Lakers will get better, gradually. It will just be too gradually for the comfort of some fans.

But be patience, people. This team will win and we do mean win it all, eventually. Probably
next season. Let's just embrace the ascent and anticipate the view from that most Laker of peaks, the tippy top of Molehill Kilimanjaro.

Understand, please, the Lakers will struggle at times in getting there.

You just read it here first. But you certainly didn't just read it here last.

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